Willzo

I saw this movie for the first time a few days ago, and I took away two thoughts. 1. This is just about the most depressing film ever made. 2. This is not really a horror picture, or a sci-fi picture. Those elements are present, but the story itself is really an existentialist drama. The most fascinating moments, to me, involve Brundle's metamorphosis, and his total disability to figure out who he is, to make any sense of his continually changing identity. It really makes you think while you're being grossed out. You don't get a lot of that anymore.

I cannot stress the extent to which I was shocked that this film was the work of Peter Jackson, who gave us before such ridiculously funny films as Dead Alive and Meet the Feebles, and also Heavenly Creatures, which is one of the most innovative and powerful movies I have ever seen. The Frighteners was, to quote a friend of mine, extraordinary only in its mediocrity; a film totally bereft of Jackson's usual spark and wicked sense of humor.

Though I have faith that he will redeem himself somewhere down the line, I find it difficult to let him slide so easily with this film: in all of its many facets it is unentertaining and uninvolving, and gives him a bad name.